What are they thinking?

[Ducimus]

Oh god that middle picture reminds me of something youd see on CNN during the first gulf war. Well done parody.

[The Noob]

Please do not Flame Iran or muslims, after the Muslim Cartoon disaster this could make the Situation even worse. I am NOT a muslim or a friend of iran, but i think we should be careful that we don't make them even more angry.

And, if America has Nuklear technology, why iran shouldn't? It's thier right! It's every Nations Right! I cannot support the american governement in tyrraning the rest of the world with nukes just cos they are the only ones who have them. To avoid america Tyrran other countrys cos they are the only ones with nukes there are Two solutions:

1.Nobody has Nukes.
2.Everybody has 'em.

I do not need America as "World Sherrif". And Iran even less...

(With america i mean the Governement there.)

I hope you understood me right.

[Wildcat]

Who cares about what Iran wants. Iran wants to get invaded, judging by the way it behaves. Ahmadinejad needs to have a bullet inserted into his brain and the rest of his political cronies need to walk out or get the same treatment.

Crap like that has got to stop, right now.

[TLAM Strike]

Originally Posted by The Noob

And, if America has Nuklear technology, why iran shouldn't? It's thier right! It's every Nations Right!
...
I do not need America as "World Sherrif". And Iran even less...

Three words "Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty". The world fought hard trying to make sure these damn things don't get used again and the western world finally developed an agreement that most of the world (including Iran) agreed on and now they are just going to illegally break their agreement?

If the US and its allies don’t step up and inforce the will of the world whose going to? The UN? When was the last time the UN went and enforced the will of its member states by force against an agressive hostile power? The Korean War 50 years ago? Be glad the US gives a damn, there have been too many times already when the US has ignored things like this and lots have died.

[Happy Times]

Please do not Flame Iran or muslims, after the Muslim Cartoon disaster this could make the Situation even worse. I am NOT a muslim or a friend of iran, but i think we should be careful that we don't make them even more angry.

[img]http://www.tu****a.com/catalog/images/_cards/qcards/Q0113.jpg[/img]

[Ducimus]

Originally Posted by The Noob

after the Muslim Cartoon disaster this could make the Situation even worse. I am NOT a muslim or a friend of iran, but i think we should be careful that we don't make them even more angry.

With all due respect, i personnaly will not curb my speech, nor thoughts to placate a nameless mob of fanatical zealots who's well being i honestly could care less about. Least of all Iran. Ive heard many times they raise their people at a very early age to hate americans. So why should anyone respect a country and people who breeds and instills hate within their young, and whos goverment reinacts policies remincent of the third reich?

As for nukes, like it or not, it is best left as it is.
Nukes were a byproduct of WW2. The modern reality is that few nations can be trusted with this technology. If everyone had nukes we'd all be living in a cold war world of brinksmanship where at any time, a nutjob like the one in iran could get a little trigger happy and press the button. Likewise the targeted nation would respond, and well, there you have WW3.

While i joke about nuking the muslim world (primarly because im starting to beleive their fanaticsm should be matched and repelled by equal zeal, and what better way then making them glow :P ), the reality is we would never nuke anyone ever again. We've done it once, and we found its not cool. They however, have an opposing view, a view which precludes any sense of responsblity.

Nuclear technology isnt anyones right, no nation is entitled to have it, ESPECIALLY one where its leader advocates wiping a nation off the face of the planet. ( If somone who said he wanted to kill your family said owning a large knife was his right, would you give him one?) Of course all of this makes my nuclear joking, to me, all that much more delicious. Nuking iran off the face of the planet.. the country which advocates the same to others. That would be a bitter sweet bit of irony.

[scandium]

Meanwhile back on planet earth:

Experts say report of badges for Jews in Iran is untrue:

http://www.canada.com/nationalpost/n...e-bb91af82abb3

Several experts are casting doubt on reports that Iran had passed a law requiring the country’s Jews and other religious minorities to wear coloured badges identifying them as non-Muslims.

This propaganda buildup, with its recent barrage of hyperbolic and sensational stories about a place most people paid scant attention to 2 years ago, reminds me of how people swallowed everything they read about Iraq 3 years ago without the slightest bit of critical examination.

People don't even seem to notice how many of these stories are all coming from the same Iranian ex-patriot (the Iranian Ahmed Chalabi), Amir Taheri, or that he's a paid public speaker at the same firm that's also employed Richard Perle.

Not that some of what we're reading isn't true (as the best propaganda, and the greatest lies and distorions, all contain a grain of truth), but IMHO those who take everything they read as gospel, and without any further examination, are little better than Pavlov's dogs.

[The Noob]

Originally Posted by Happy Times

[img]http://www.tu****a.com/catalog/images/_cards/qcards/Q0113.jpg[/img]

Yup, thats what i'm doing.

@TLAM Strike
That would be a Reason. But, why does damn America needs to Play Sherrif? Can't another country do that? I just hate the American Governement.

@Ducimus
Are you american? I don't have to discuss politics with a Bush loving manipulatet Person. And thats like you sound.

Originally Posted by Ducimus

If somone who said he wanted to kill your family said owning a large knife was his right, would you give him one?

If i can have one too, yes.

Personally i hope america and Iran both get Nuked in the Process of the Upcoming war.

[Excalibur Bane]

I'm surprised the whole cartoon fiasco was allowed to happen at all. I don't know the situation, I don't care for politics but if that was my country I would not allow religious fanatics to protest and generally deny people free speech. Nor terroize people because they portrayed some holy figure. Personally, I would have arranged for some very tragic accidents to happen to each and every idiot who voiced an objection to the cartoon. People protesting about free speech and the right to say whatever the hell you like, I never thought I'd see the day.

[The Noob]

[TLAM Strike]

Originally Posted by The Noob

@TLAM Strike
That would be a Reason. But, why does damn America needs to Play Sherrif? Can't another country do that? I just hate the American Governement.

Name ones that’s tried? Since the days of Teddy Roosevelt the US has went out and protected the less fortunate and tried to maintain peace in the world while other nations have been trying to gobble up territory or settle old scores. Remember the League of Nations? Yea sure it failed but I don’t remember a European leader purposing it? What did they fight for at the The Paris Peace Conference? How would Germany be punished and how much of the spoils of war would they get. After WWII what did the US do to prevent another world war? The UN. And it worked more or less for around 40 years until the rest of the world stopped having the guts to do what it agreed to and its officers decided personal profit was more important than the common good.

I ask you what other country is going to do this if not us?

[Happy Times]

It is true that many Americans have too little knowledge of outside world but this forum proves that some are interested to keep themself informed. And i believe people working in their goverment, intelligence services and military arent totally stupid people.

[scandium]

Originally Posted by Excalibur Bane

I'm surprised the whole cartoon fiasco was allowed to happen at all. I don't know the situation, I don't care for politics but if that was my country I would not allow religious fanatics to protest and generally deny people free speech. Nor terroize people because they portrayed some holy figure. Personally, I would have arranged for some very tragic accidents to happen to each and every idiot who voiced an objection to the cartoon. People protesting about free speech and the right to say whatever the hell you like, I never thought I'd see the day.

I don't agree with it either but two things:

1. They were also exercising their own right to protest. Yes, there is irony in people using a democratic right to protest the media exercising its democratic right to print a cartoon but such is life and I don't mind them protesting as it is their right. I disagree with them but that is my right. However when people use their freedom of speech and to protest as a forum for hatred and to incite violence or convey death threats, then that is another thing. That is not freedom of expression but (at least here in Canada) a potential hate crime that can (at least here) and should be proescuted to the fullest extent possible;

2. In this last regard, you yourself, by implying that people should "meet with some tragic style accident" (what do you have in mind, KGB style asassinations?) merely for airing their opinions are little better then the worst of them are.

I just hope all of this hatred (and it is thinly disguided hatred in the best cases, outright xenophobia and racism in the worst) expressed here on this forum, in this thread and the many anti-muslim threads just like it (that myself and others have noticed pop up at least once per day, every day), do not actually express the mainstream views of the supposedly educated and civilized countries we claim to live in. If they do then dark times certainly do await us.

[scandium]

Originally Posted by TLAM Strike

Since the days of Teddy Roosevelt the US has went out and protected the less fortunate and tried to maintain peace in the world while other nations have been trying to gobble up territory or settle old scores.

Or at least that is what they teach you to believe (and many of us as well, whose school books also happen to be written in the United States).

You have a valid point that up until, and including, WWII this was exactly what other countries were doing in one form or another. And there's no denying that many things the US has done have had a benevolent impact (the Marshall Plan is a prime example). But is this the full story of US intervention? Is its foreign policy really driven by a desire to maintain peace and help the less fortunate around the world? I think not, on both counts.

Let's look at "gobbling up territory", as an example. How well has this worked out for the old Imperial Powers? I would say not too well if you look at the world today where almost all of the former colonies have achieved independence - sometimes, as in the case of the US itself, at the cost of a expensive and bloody war for independence. Has the US been ruled by a succession of leaders too out of touch to see this? Obviously not (exception being the current President).

There's a much more modern and effective way of achieving imperial style wealth and power without conquering anyone: economic imperialism. Like the imperialism of old it transfers the wealth and resources out of the client state and into the imperial power, but without all of the expense and mess of old fashioned colonialsm with its need for occupation and risk of rebellion. Its a subtler, kinder imperialism that all Western countries wage but that the US wages better than anyone.

[TLAM Strike]

Originally Posted by Happy Times

It is true that many Americans have too little knowledge of outside world but this forum proves that some are interested to keep themself informed. And i believe people working in their goverment, intelligence services and military arent totally stupid people.

Well I for one grew up with a map of the world, and a map of the solar system on the wall and a globe circa 1950 (given to me by my dad and since given to our neighbors spoiled kids… one day if they haven’t destroyed it I should take it back) on my dresser.

On that globe there was only 1 country that my ancestors came from that was on that map: England. The other two not so much. About half the countries on that globe say they belonged (Ex. French Indo China) to someone else or were big chunks of nations where many smaller ones are now (Ex. USSR, France’s Central African Republic). The United States of America is the same as it is today as it was on that globe (a few small islands not withstanding)

Maybe thats the reason I think they way I do.